I bought my wife a laptop for her birthday, and one gripe comes readily to mind.

Why have most laptop manufacturers not yet figured out how to solve the issue of the cumbersome power cord connection?

My old HP had the long, straight plug which came out of the back.

This connection was easily bent if you had the laptop sitting on your lap and you had a blanket or something else that could bunch up behind the laptop. After some time, this connection becomes weak from having all of the additional strain on it, and it could sometimes disconnect or fail to power the laptop.

My wife’s new computer has a long, straight plug coming out of the side.

This side configuration means that the plug can easily get bent if you sit too close to an obstruction or, again, if you have a blanket, etc on your lap while you’re using your computer.

I think that, at this point, I’m the most impressed with Apple’s magnetic power adapter (…and everyone who knows me gasped in awe). Yeah, it will come unplugged if you put pressure against it, but it won’t cause damage to your laptop!

What if the cord was mounted on top near one of the hinges for the screen? They could use a 90 degree plug and put a little cutaway on the top part of the laptop so the lid could close and open without interfering with the plug. This would also give you an extra 1/2″ to 1″ clearance for a blanket or something behind your computer.

What are your thoughts? What’s the best way to solve this issue (or did Apple already figure it out)?

Oh, and just for fun, you should visit this website. It’s what inspired me to start this blog in the first place!

I’m a fan of HP computers, and I’m a fan of “new” touch-technology, but that doesn’t mean that they should always be combined…

I’m not talking about the HP TouchSmart, although I’ve seen countless refurbished TouchSmarts on woot.com, so they must not last too long…

This is about that pesky touch volume control on the HP Elite series laptops.

I usually spend a good 30 – 45 seconds trying to get the volume where I want it. You can’t tap the “+” or “-” buttons to adjust the volume, you have to slide your finger from “-” to “+” (or the inverse to turn it down).

If you slide from one side to another, you might get one or two bars louder (maybe), but not much more. However, if you put your finger in the middle of the control and rock it to one side, it might all of a sudden fly up to max volume. It really is that unpredictable.

Every time I have to change the volume, I close my eyes and pray that there will be an analog volume control wheel when I open my eyes…unfortunately, that hasn’t happened yet.

Design is important, and marketing is important, but, in my opinion, it is better to not attempt something if you can’t at least make it usable.